Renewal of the Šluknov Spur

Based on an in-depth analysis of urban structures and cultural landscape, the project aims to strengthen disfunctional centers of small towns in a peripheral borderland region. Each town asks for a different approach, therefore the proposed solutions range from spatial planning and public space design to the importance of an individual building.

Out of the ten towns analyzed, three were selected as representative of various reoccurring issues in the region. As each of these is tackling a different problem, the approach varies from spatial planning and urban design to the placement of an individual building and the role it can have in rebuilding a town’s identity and public life. Lobendava, the town that has lost the most inhabitants, is approached through the revision of the current spatial plan. The issue is a continuous dissolving of the urban structure into the landscape and the town losing its shape and density needed for sustaining lively public spaces. The revision focuses on inner reserves which when filled in strategically can largely impact the strength of the towns‘ center. The city of Velký Šenov suffers from having vacancies and parking lots in place of public spaces. A wider urbanistic approach is required to uncover historical developmental layers and form an interconnected public space system. A new main square is shaped by newly proposed buildings serving a public and residential function. A historical town square is discovered and revived in connection to the local church. And lastly a large brownfield is turned into a residential area with mixed public and private owned apartments and in connection to a new craft reeducation space. A bonus here is the opportunity to utilise a forgotten creek, a common part of local towns and settlements, and turn it into a lively waterfront connecting main residential areas. The last town is perhaps the most symbolic. It’s previously lively church has been torn down in the seventies, which is very representative of immense destruction of cultural heritage that took place during the communist era. A new building following the destroyed chuch’s footprints is proposed to once again give purpose to the main public space and is designed with the symbolic use of local material still present from torn-down buildings. It is thought as a place of memory and local culture while being the vertical dominant the town desperately needs back to anchor it in the landscape.